Teamed to Teach: Integrating Teacher Training through Cooperative Teaching at an Urban Professional Development School

Abstract

One feature of current school reform efforts has been the formation of partnerships between schools and universities in the form of Professional Development Schools (PDS). In this article we describe a Professional Development School project at two schools in New York City that has resulted from collaborative efforts of staff members of Community School District #3, the United Federation of Teachers, and Teachers College, Columbia University. A major problem confronting teachers in urban schools is a pervasive sense of isolation. To combat this problem, a cooperative teaching approach was adopted as a focus of this PDS project. An outgrowth of this approach has been the joint preparation of special and regular education students enrolled in preservice programs.